Rutger Hauer plays Roy Batty â an android, with a limited lifespan,(he dies in the scene above), but who nevertheless possesses emotion and self-awareness â Hauerâs role made him a cult icon.

I remember walking towards Hauer in a backstreet in London, some years ago. He was magneticâŚbig and tall, with piercing ice-blue eyes. I thought he was like a giant, brutal Paul NewmanâŚperfect casting.

Synthetic life is now upon us. Only yesterday the press proclaimed the creation of an artificial reproducing cellâŚartificial DNA, typed on a computer and inserted into the hollowed out shell of a bacteriaâŚ

Is it right or wrong? Is it simply inevitable that science will finally be able to create life â intelligent, self-aware life â from scratch?

Or does possible distaste depend on a localized GodâŚwho does Godâs work

What aboutÂ a universal âGodâ which includes ourselves and everything â plants, animals, rocks âÂ even âsyntheticâ lifeâ.

If we are part of that âAllâ, does that allow us to âplayâ God?

I think humanity will inevitably create synthetic living creatures from the living cells that scientists have just begun to create. We have always made images of ourselves and our fellow creatures â perhaps reaching for theÂ immortality that Rutger Hauerâs Android desired.

I’ve just woken from a dream. I seldom remember my dreams, although I’m sort of aware that there is another world I return to each night. This particular chink in the wall, showed me a dream of devastation and loss.

I’ve been up for 2 hours and I can’t sleep although I want a simple oblivion before the coming day.

It’s difficult to focus at the moment, but the Red Chakra purrs a warming vibration.

Sometimes the heights of blue and violet are too intense and the frequency of their astral song is beyond my hearing.

When I was in my 20’s, I had a great time, potholing (caving) in the Yorkshire Dales. Time off work from my job as a cave-guide, would find me sliding and slithering as I worked my way underground, often in spaces so small that it was impossible to get through without taking off my protective helmet and its lifesaving headlamp and sliding them along in front of me.

I often used to wonder what would happen if the bulb failed – I never went caving alone – but I knew one or two foolhardy types, who would disappear off by themselves, beyond the back of the show-cave and along passages and underground streams that led to the centre of Ingleborough mountain – and I don’t remember them ever taking spare bulbs.

I can remember myself and another guide, pausing for a rest in a narrow slit in the limestone only about 18" high, but wide enough to go off in many (wrong) directions - and switching off our lights. The blackness was absolute. The total lack of light fascinated me and my eyes felt as if they were standing out of their sockets as they strained hopelessly to find a glimmer of the vibration we perceive as ‘light’.

Light can only exist and be perceived, if the energy source/transmitter is present and the receiving visual mechanism and its link to the brain is in working order and operating at the correct frequency. If the receiver is none functional, light as a personal experience within our five senses is therefore an impossibility - although there are cases of people with the ability to see through skin tissue.

If the sun were to extinguish and if the energy of all the other molten and volatile planets and stars that emit the vibrations of light and heat were to dissipate and fade, there would be no source and therefore no transmitter - then again, there would be no ‘me’ or ‘you’ either – at least in this dimension.

In the evenings, after I had taken the last party of tourists around the natural stalactite and stalagmite formations and returned from my own cave-explorations, I would walk home through the dark forest at the base of the mountain, towards the village. I would usually stop at some point and stand silently amongst the trees. On moon and starless nights, I would again find myself in almost total darkness, until my eyes became attuned enough to pick up the faintest glimmer of light around me - a glimmer that did not exist underground.

Slowly my surroundings would start to become apparent. The outline of trees and rocks would form from the blackness and gradually I would be able to see enough of the path to be able to walk through the forest, without slipping and falling down the slope to my left, into the stream that flowed from the mountain and from the entrance to the cave in which I worked.

As I trudged home, usually alone as my companion was staying in a semi-derelict cottage near the cavern, I would stop and listen carefully. Gradually my ears would pick up the small rustling sounds of unknown animals in the darkness – and the giggling and gurgling of the forest spirits. Of course it was the sound of the stream (I thought) as it flowed over rocks and boulders - but it did sound like words and muffled laughter. It was easy to imagine the malevolent *boggarts as they clustered in the dark and to almost hear their whispered secrets.

-

Some people will see a fairy at the bottom of their garden, another will see a flower - the energy-cluster is the same. The fact that one person sees the energy-cluster as a Bluebell and another person sees it as Tinkerbell, does nothing to disprove the existence of the energy-cluster itself - it only goes to acknowledge an initial perception and the many variations of comprehension that may follow.

*boggart ~ ‘In the folklore of North-West England, boggarts live under bridges on dangerous sharp bends on roads, and it is considered bad luck for drivers not to offer their polite greetings as they cross.’ ~ Wikipedia.

They also live in the limestone caves in the area. “Boggart’s Roaring Hole” is a pothole on the flanks of Ingleborough Mountain, from which mysterious and frightening sounds can sometimes be heard. ~ h.

image at head of post from Wikimedia Commons - click on photo for link

The location of spirit is a natural outcome of our three-dimensional perceptions and of our physical location upon this planet.

Many people will acknowledge Heaven as a state of afterlife with celestial trees, fields rivers and sunlight in the company of Angels; but avoid a similar three-dimensional perception of Hell as a place of flames and darkness, inhabited by clove-footed demons and tortured souls.

One perception cannot live without the other. A Heaven of green fields and blessed sunlight together with the sounds of joy and laughter, cannot be part of our three-dimensional comprehension of the spiritual world, unless we also acknowledge the existence of a Hell of molten rocks and lava and the wailing despair of souls lost in the sulphuric darkness.

Exercise 1.

Look downward and focus on the centre of the earth.

Now recite the Lord’s Prayer.

What are your thoughts and feelings after doing the exercise? (or declining)

I will be publishing the final part of my trilogy on the Summer Solstice celebrations at Stonehenge in a few days and I thought that the video below might be helpful.

The terms "Paganism" and "Pagan" can strike a chill in many people and give rise to a fear that to study or follow it may in some way be a betrayal of deeply held Christian or other mainstream religious beliefs. I admit that for quite a long while, I avoided the term and used "natural" or "nature" religion in order to spare peoples feelings and also to avoid misconceptions about the path I was following. (I have found I can silence a dinner-party by using the term a little too loudly.) I feel that ‘Paganism’ has such a potent, often media-sensationalised loading, (especially as I am currently writing about the Solstice) that it is a good time to share the Rev. Youngers honest sermon.

I used to have a similar problem with the word ‘drug’ - when my mother had to start treatment for her heart, she returned from the doctor’s surgery one day, alarmed and angry. "He wants me to take Drugs!" ….if only the doctor had used the term ‘medicine’ it would have saved me a long explanation (which still didn’t convince her).

I must say I find the Reverend’s manner a tad aggressive, but I guess that must have been in relationship to the group to whom he was addressing his sermon.

The video is 23 min’s long, but there’s a lot of information there, and apart from a bit of a cough, Rev. Younger is on form. So I suggest you make a cup of tea (or whatever) and get comfortable.

As for me, I am a Pagan - and I’m also a ‘Jesus-fan’.

When you’ve finished watching and if you’re still interested, double-click on the screen and go through to MySpace, where you can read some of the 111 comments that have been posted since the video was first published in October 2006 - the latest comments were posted only last month.

If you want to read about my visit to Stonehenge go to Dusk ’till Dawn for the first episode and to Flowers and Scorpions for the second. I have decided to put the third and final part in "Flowers" in a few days - click alerts/contact if you want to be notified by email when it’s published.

Finally my gratitude to Roger Stigers "He Who Walks in the Shadows" for publishing this on MySpace - He must have the credit for putting the vid’ up in the first place. - click on his name to go to his "MySpace" page, where you can contact him and read/see more of his work - and link to his blog.

Angels are: "Soulless beings who represent nothing but the thoughts and intuitions of their Lord."

I then finished the entry with a statement of my own

"Angels are the Gateway and the prism through which we can see the full spectrum of God".

If you look at the illustration here and imagine that the prism is an Angel, I think my statement becomes clear. An angel does not (according to Jung) have a Soul, because the Angel’s soul is in fact a gateway and a focus to the Soul of God. An Angel enables us to see, not simply white light, but the full spectrum of the Divine.

Newton experimented with prisms and discovered that the prism did not colour the light, as had previously been thought. People had been experimenting with prisms and light for many years, but thought that the prism itself coloured the light in some way. Newton proved that in fact, the prism allows us to see the colour ‘within’, or more exactly ‘that is’ the light.

Therefore, viewing an Angel as a prism is compatible with the Angel’s main function (as the name angelus implies) namely that of a messenger or transmitter of ‘The All.’ In other words, the angel interprets but does not add (his) own colour to the transmission.

Despite amazing advances in science and technology, I think that we as human beings, still only tend to believe what we can perceive through our five senses. Any sixth (and more) senses are regarded with suspicion and are usually at best palmed off as ‘instinct’ or at best ‘intuition’. There is a line of thought however, which equates ‘instinct’ or intuitive hunches with angelic influence. Richard Webster "spirit guides guardian angels" states: "Are these (intuitive) messages from our angel guardians? I would have to say "yes." It follows then that we perceive that part of the physical and spiritual spectrum which is visible within the limitations of our human senses - we tend to think that what we cannot perceive or register through our known senses, does not exist - despite knowing, through acquired knowledge, that the full spectrum of light ranges from infra-red to ultra-violet.

I’m sure you’re ahead of me in relating the visible spectrum to that most beautiful of natural phenomena, the rainbow. A rainbow is comprised of seven (yes seven again) colours: Red, Orange, Yellow,Green, Blue, Indigo and Violet. The illustration here gives the British mnemonic for the colours, but since 48% of this blog’s readership comes from the United States and Canada, perhaps you have your own memory-aid (or make one up and leave it in ‘comments’ :))

There was some dismay when Newton published his findings. Many people thought that the scientist had taken away the mystery and the holiness associated with God’s Covenant, failing to appreciate the natural miracle because it took away the personified image of God as a grey-bearded craftsman/creator, making a rainbow as a direct result of Noah and the Flood. The more feminine religions of the East however had naturally woven what could be described as a spiritual science which can be found in the 7 energy centres or Chakras of the human body and it’s holistic relationship to the world and the universe.

Angel Guardians

As well as being a Gateway to the All, Angels are the filters or guardians of our perceptions and contacts beyond the Gate. The triangular shape of the prism has long been regarded as the entrance to the spiritual plane; from the pyramids to the Holy Trinity, the number three and it’s triangular construction is regarded as sacred throughout humanity.

The Need for an Angel Guardian

Part of my motivation to start this series of posts on Angels and what I will call the "Otherworld" is to show that there is actually no division between the two. The division is caused by our inability to see and experience what is all around and within us. Not all influences beyond our five senses are safe however and ‘going it alone’ on a spiritual search can lead us into great danger.

Ouja (Weegee) Board

This is usually played at university or summer school after a good night out and with a cut-out alphabet and an empty wine glass (empty because it’s usually played when the red wine has run out). So the scenario is already perilous; slightly tipsy people having ‘fun’ with ghosts. This is the reverse peril of ‘personification’ - because the old images of the Devil, Pan, Cernunnos, Fairies and other Elementals are rejected by our ‘advanced’ society, people therefore fail to see that the forces that make up the old images are very real and conscious and existing at a level beyond our ability to easily perceive them.

The Planchette

Usually this is the wine glass or tumbler, but on a manufactured board, it is likely to be triangular. Therefore the participants in a Ouija-Séance are going it alone through their own unguarded gateway, without angelic protection. My advice is to not do it. The results are real, no matter if you ‘believe’ or not. You may be lucky and meet a benign presence - or you may find that your angel guardian has been replaced by the hounds of hell. If you are serious, I cannot in all honesty dissuade you from trying - just don’t mess around with it.

Working with Angels

I thought I’d finish this overview by suggesting a way of working with your angel guardians: Go to the previous post and look at the list of the seven archangels. Choose the archangel who you think will help you with a specific problem and invite that angel to help you. For example, if you need clarity of thought, focus on and ask Uriel for help: